


the cuckoo

by aPaperCupCut



Category: Darkwood (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Complicated Relationships, Dreams, Familial Relationships, Nobinary Stranger, Other, POV Second Person, Sad Ending, The Being & The Elephants & Various Others pop up, Time Skips, Trader is a Replica Theory, Vague Symbolism, Yearning, can be read as stranger/trader but intended to be read as queerplatonic, i just went super self indulgent with this thing, if u pick up what the symbolism is i'll hug u, implied nonbinary trader, mild body horror, nonbinary characters - Freeform, speed running being a parent: a guide by the trader, yknow this fic is... kinda weird
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-27
Updated: 2020-12-27
Packaged: 2021-03-11 08:54:12
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,697
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28348728
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aPaperCupCut/pseuds/aPaperCupCut
Summary: What do you do?In April, I open my billIn May, I sing night and dayIn June, I change my tuneIn July, far off I flyIn August, awayI must...Cuckoo Song - Cosmo Sheldrake
Relationships: The Stranger & The Trader (queerplatonic), familial The Stranger & The Musician, familial The Trader & The Musician
Comments: 1
Kudos: 4





	the cuckoo

**Author's Note:**

> do not @ me abt the modern slang meaning of the word, im tellin u, theres a lotta sad meanings tied to the bird ok
> 
> also idk but just in case : a queerplatonic relationship is something that exists under the ambiguous queer umbrella; to put it possibly in too simple terms, its a relationship that is more intimate/intense than a platonic one, but does not operate as a romantic relationship. i fiercely headcannon these two to have that. but also yea, u can read this as just strange stranger/trader if u want to
> 
> [also heres the playlist i made specifically for this fic ](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLRY4MYm28Wv21y59WHxRWhaBelvDvexyW)
> 
> also btw, this is the only darkwood imma write. yall are freaking awesome
> 
> as another tidbit, i really struggled with the ending. but when i read the multiple attempts i made, this felt the right way for me. i hope yall like it, regardless of my clumsiness with words

  
  


You don't know how you managed to reach this place.

Maybe it was the silent way the trees had for telling you secrets; the silent way your own thoughts worked, without words or much sound. You cannot be certain. All you know, and all that matters, is that you have reached safety - a very pale facsimile of safety, but it is the very first place you've felt a measure of calm within in what feels like a very long time.

You had told them. You had told them, but they had not listened, and they left you, again, alone, when you, you  _ had, _ you were alone again. Again, again.

You inhale shakily, a long breath that rattles in your chest and brings your aches and pains into stark relief. You won't deny that you aren't much for strenuous effort; as much as it pains you to admit, you aren't made for it.

You weren't made for much at all.

But these thoughts hardly help matters - you need to focus. On the here and now, on the path ahead. On the path ahead…

You had thought that they knew the path ahead. You had so wanted to believe that. But really, you shouldn't have entertained such… hope. There is little one can do with a thing such as hope, in a place like this. And still, you had tried.

Their hands, cradling that photograph to nothing and nowhere; that should've told you, but you didn't want to hear it. Didn't want to listen.

But you had hoped. You had tried.

You hope that that matters, at the very least. You know it doesn't, but… You realize you are reluctant to let things go. You also realize that such a sad facet of yourself shouldn't be news, but it is, because you don't like to think this way.

You sigh heavily, as much as you can, as much as you are willing to without thinking of the way your body moves with the motion. Your shoulders ache, and you have to force a tremble down. Your lungs are numb, the branches inside threading up your throat, a sensation reminding you, absurdly, of the brisk way they don't look you in the eye.

At least you feel no danger here. That is something you wouldn't have expected in this part of the Forest.

There was much danger on your journey here. They had left, and you hadn't known what to do. You had dwelled, you think, for some time; but your options, as limited as they were, could not stop you from making your choice.

( _ insistence; what else is there for you? _ )

You won't just let them  _ leave. _ You won't just let them wander into the forests hungry jaws, a lamb to the slaughter. As foolish as it may be, as inevitable as it may be - they do not  _ understand _ . They can't. And you find yourself accepting of that, but in the same mindless way you feel yourself do that, you are unwilling to leave them alone.

You aren't them. But you, together, are brothers. They are your blood and bone. You won't leave them, even if they will leave you, abandoned, decaying softly back into the wretched growths of the Forest.

The darkness is warm. The morn is gentle, as it always is. You often wonder why it gives you this; sometimes, you think it more a cruelty than a kindness.

You are hid away, and the wood beneath your hands tells you you are close. Close, very close. The night is not quite gone, but it is evaporated enough into the early day that you feel safe coming out from the hole in which you hid yourself. You only have a short distance left to go.

To reunite, to  _ return. _ You won't fool yourself - you will be of little assistance in this place. You still eagerly move forward, thoughts already cautiously beginning to envision their shadowed face.

But you must not let down your guard. As safe as the morn feels, it is not as safe as it appears. All safe places hold that nature; momentary, apt to vanish like fog in sunlight.

Or perhaps more like a hand in a storming black sea. Drowning, silently.

Just over the rise of the hill you climb, you see a wall; a building - several. It isn't the first group of rudimentary shelters you've seen in this familiar-unfamiliar place, decayed and aged, but it's a sight that sends a thrill of  _ here, they're here _ through you. You are so very close, now, but as you step hastily through murky waters, you pause.

You can't tell what you sense, then. You can't tell what sets you off, an alarm ringing silently. All you know is that you're being watched, and the gaze that weighs heavily upon you is not kind.

You are almost frozen, inept, in a moment of indecision; ahead of you, your ( _ false _ ) pulse races, and your eyes are locked on that sliver of wall peeking over the hill. But you are thrumming with a sense that has always aided you - when you first arrived, when you first wandered, before you found them again.

Not all are kind to a being such as you. Very few are, in fact, and you're only treated without hostility due to your talent at finding useful things.

Somehow, you do not think that whatever is watching you will provide mercy to you like that.

It pains you. Immensely. But you cannot reunite if you are dead. So you close your eyes, in that split moment, and dart away - into the dense of the trees, into the undergrowth. The Forest welcomes you into the darkness readily,  _ too _ readily. This close, you can feel its hunger. But you have chosen, you have decided, and as you hear feet and bells whisper past you, lingering as if knowing - you know you will have it no other way than this.

Inevitable as it all is, helpless as you are - you won't let go, not even in the face of your own eagerness.

( _ desperation. _ )

* * *

The night falls thickly, heavily, and unbearable. You are irritable; you can't help it. You clutch your wrists, a wheeze rattling around in your chest, unhappy and impatient.

You have no wish to wait another day; not when you suspect the bells and little feet will return in the early hours, once again entrapping you. You have not wandered far from where you hid; your hiding place is one ripe with mushrooms, easily covering your own sweet fungal scent. Many things live in this part of the wood; you find yourself, strangely, afraid.

There is an insatiable hunger, lurking in the trees; it devours its stillborns, its afterbirth, and its wailing children all the same. You know all too well how easily your flesh gives beneath violence.

The thought refuses to tug free from your mind, once you've had it: you cannot reunite if you die. They, they are different - you care not why. But it is this difference that makes the thought so heavy. If you die, if you die…

You shake your head. If you are safe, you won't die. You can no longer trade for your safety, not as before, nor freely wander as you once had. Not here. It is not safe here, where the dead are as hungry as the living, and the forest is eager for every droplet of life it can swallow.

Not that you can trade, regardless, even once you've gained sea legs; the villagers you followed here are already falling deeper into their illness, and what few locals who remained through the years are hostile and grown strange with time. No, there is not much to encourage you, even if it would be beneficial to them, even if it would give them reason to let you stay.

Look - you don't like these thoughts. They are winding and careless, and give you an unpleasant ache in your chest, which you dislike even more. You prefer the ease with which you spent your days, after you had found them and they had not yet found the key.

The key…

Again, you shake your head. The night, it addles you. You need to make a decision. You need to assess your options.

( _ earnest; please don't leave without me, not like before. _ )

You pull yourself free from the hands of the fungi, several holding fast until you pull out a handy knife and slice through the flesh of it. It shrivels back, sad and dejected, but you pay no mind; it is  _ move now _ or  _ move never,  _ and you will never stop moving. Not completely. Not yet.

There is no moon to guide your way, but you have no need for it. The weight of the pitch black sky rests heavy on your shoulders. 

_ Now _ or  _ never _ .

Slowly, carefully, you creep through the trees. You keep away from the clearing you had crossed before, instead skirting it. Very soon, the sliver of wall appears, and then grows; there, there they will be.

You cannot help smiling; you barely remember what that looks like, let alone what it is, but if you did you know you would be 'smiling widely'. Even if you cannot offer a steady flow of supplies to them, you did bring as much as you could. You hope that it will please them.

The generator hums, but it isn't long before you realize that, despite all appearances, the buildings are… empty.

Not unused, but it is as if they are not here - not right now. The sight, of empty room after empty room, your footsteps near silent, leaves you almost stunned; you don't know what to do.

It is then that a different light catches your attention. It drifts from the aperture of a sturdy metal door, black marks wandering across the floor, entering the room beyond. You pause, and consider. The safehouse is quiet, except for the noise of the generator, and there is… an aura, not unfamiliar to you, of peace. You don't usually wander their 'hideouts' -  _ safehouses,  _ to you - but you cannot find it within yourself to rein in your curiosity. What harm can it do, just this once?

There is a breathing, laborious and strained, that shifts quicker and deeper as the door creaks fully open under your mittened palm. As you peer inside, you are not surprised to see a monster staring back at you.

It is not hostile; you pause, waiting, but all it does is stare, darkness shrouding its face. But… 

It looks familiar. You step forward, trying to place its masked face, its broad, deformed body. It struggles, lifting its head and arms, its knees shaking. 

You step closer. The light, from nowhere and everywhere, suffuses on its pallid, strained skin. Its little mask has popped strings, meant to keep it on its face - but no longer needed. The wood grain grows into its stretched features, forever hiding its eyes.

"Y-you…" it says, its voice quiet and - that of a child's. "I-I know you, M-mister. My m-mommy said you give t-t-things, t-t-trading. She said you-you're nice."

( _ child - what has happened to you? _ )

You are at once afraid and pained.

It can't manage to lift its head. Its neck is bowed, curled in on itself, leaving its head at a permanent cant, as if in pained melancholy, and you place its visage so suddenly and so strongly that it is all you can do to not back up and flee the claustrophobic little room. Your heart  _ aches, _ the kind of ache you struggle to swallow.

It doesn't seem to notice your epiphany, nor your sudden misery; it goes on, "I-I'm sorry, s-s-sorry, mister. I d-don't… don't have a-anything."

It seems to grow even sadder, if that is possible, its head fallen down against its shuddering, knobby knees. "A-a-all I have, is m-my violin… and, and now it's t-too small for me."

You can't stand this. You fight down ( _ repulsion? horror? either would make you a hypocrite _ ) your first impulse, and instead reach for its hands. 

You are too late, to stop it from making… crying sounds. What else can it be? It is crying, as surely as a scared, lonely child would, as surely as the child you know it is. As the child you know  _ he _ is.

You  _ know _ this child. The ache in your chest, the horror, the disgust - where are his parents? His father may not care for him, but his mother has always loved him. She was one of the few to speak to you without fear, only asking that you protect the children if you could, if you saw them in danger.

You had shaken your head, then. The other villagers kept you from the children; they hid them, when you were permitted into the village. There weren't many left; so many small graves… 

His hands shake in yours; he almost doesn't seem to notice your touch, until he grips you, pulling you closer, and then, confusingly, pushing you back. You will take no part in that - as he gently pushes you away, you lean forward, contradicting his fear.

He's just a child.  _ Just nine, just a kid. Where is his mother? _

He makes a quaking sound, wet and creaking, and lets you gather his deformed hands in yours. One hand is overly small; the other, you struggle to pull into your grip, tremendously large as it is. It's hardly a hand anymore, more of an uprooted tree stump than anything else - but you are stubborn, and  _ you won't let go. _

At the very least, you know it helps him. His sniffles die away, his head still turned against his collarbone, hidden against his knees.

You sit down, after awhile, in front of him so that he doesn't need to stretch much for you to continue to hold his hands. An image collects in your mind, as you look at the strange vision of your hands together - a much larger hand, warm and gentle, holding yours, so much smaller and ever so slightly shaking.

Warmth and care, given with such careful consideration.

You blink away the - memory. You feel better, though, knowing that this action is not random, and that you are driven.

This poor child. His mother… is likely dead. He must've followed after the other villagers, like you had. With no one else, with no food left… 

That is when you think, quite irrationally,  _ they need to be here. _

Irrational, because, well - why? You've never asked them for much, and what you have asked of them has not ever been a demand. You won't leave them, not even if they leave you; asking them to stay in place, you think, might be like asking  _ you _ to stay in place.

The only place they'll stop is home, and you know that home is a place forever lost to the both of you. They just haven't accepted that yet, but they will - with time, and with you beside them.

And so, asking them to do something for you is a rather bit absurd. You know that others have, and sometimes they fulfill those requests and other times not, but you never have. And - you realize you don't know what you are thinking of asking, anyway.

The child, the boy you have never spoken to but have known for the sake of his mother, his mother who whispered, one of the precious few children left in this place, this Forest - he mumbles something, soft and creaking, and you turn to see someone in the doorway.

The sun has risen to a welcome sight, and your aching heart begins to grow feverishly warm. The light cuts their figure out in stark relief.

They've lost weight. 

You stand, the boy's hands still in yours, before carefully laying them back into his lap, patting them with an unseen smile.

_ Reuniting. _ You are calm. The morn has come; it whispers, smooth and angular, at the back of your mind.

They remain still as you approach, tense and… defensive? Hostile? You are bemused, or maybe bewildered. You have no reason to attack them. You could never attack them.

You've already written your greeting, and you raise it slowly, drawing back your cloak sleeve. You know your face is smiling, just as it had at the boy, in a way that people don't actually smile. You are so relieved to see them, mostly unharmed, not yet devoured by this Forest.

_ You are in its jaws, now, but we are in this together. _

You pause, watching them; when they do not react, watching you in turn, you turn your wrist.  _ I could not bring much with me. _

You draw your sack off of your back, the release of the weight forcing a great sigh from your worn lungs. They drift closer, and you can't help but compare them to a cat - cautious, wounded, but no less hungry and eager for kindness.

And you are kind. You do your utmost to be so. You know they are not the same.

You turn your head to the boy, still in the corner; he watches, eyes hidden behind his eternal mask, but you know they are wide and scrambling. With his reaction to you, and now his reaction to them - he did not know anyone else lived here.

He is a braver child than you expect. "M-mister?"

They look up, slowly, right at him without expression. They are good at that, looking like they don't feel anything at all. Like they are weighing choices - choices like  _ kill _ and  _ spare  _ and  _ ignore. _

Militantly efficient. There is no lingering nor pondering in their actions.

"I-I," the boy stutters. "I-I'm sorry, s-s-sorry, I didn't kn-know, I just wanted t-to hide, p-please don't chase me o-out, I'll be good! I promise I w-won't play anymore!"

His cries of distress unsettle you, and without thinking you return to his side. He hardly reacts to you, even as you touch his shoulder and try to radiate calm as you grasp his overlarge hand. But his fingers curl, returning your grasp.

They don't move closer, but they seem to consider the boy's pleas. After a long moment, as the boy continues weakly blubbering, they nod their head. Then, they turn to you - a question in their fogged eyes.

You let go of the child, and, with another gentle pat on his shoulder, go back to your sack. Inside, you dig out your stick of charcoal, and set to writing. When you are done, they lean in close to read the writing on your pale wrist.

_ I found him here, alone.  _ As they watch, you hesitate; and then you add,  _ I can watch him, brother, if you are troubled. _

Neither of you need ask where the child's parents are. It's not a presumptuous thing to assume that  _ not here  _ means  _ gone. _ Whether that's abandonment or something else, who can say. It hardly matters right now.

You think  _ death. _ Their eyes say  _ lost. _ You have spent all night wondering over the child's mother's absence; you need not discuss it with them.

They seem to ponder over this, and then make a gesture towards the boy. In the lines of their face, you read,  _ but why? _

You struggle to find the answer to that. When you don't write anything in response, they shrug and turn their attention to the sack laid between you.

Yes. That is easier to digest than… whatever you've gotten yourself into now.

They leave, once the transactions are completed. You would've given them everything if they'd asked, but they had a secretive look in their eyes. Not to mention that you swear you hear bells nearby - and, when they depart, they head straight for the sound.

Ah. You assume that your almost murderers are in contact with them, then; likely as traders, since that is the simplest profession to hold, here. It is likely, too, that your near miss with a grave was due to territory or thievery; either way, you are more amused than annoyed by it.

You evaded being mugged. What a funny way to die. You are glad that you managed to avoid it.

The boy shuffles around, but doesn't say much to you. It seems you could go out, get a stronger grasp of your bearings, without impacting him too much. The safehouse is relatively quiet during the day, and there is the metal door if something goes awry.

You watch the door, considering, before writing quickly on your wrist. Then you tap the child's tremendous shoulder, getting his attention.  _ I need to leave for a short time. Do you want me to look for anything for you? _

The boy reads quickly. His mouth grinds, teeth wet with saliva. He hesitates, but eventually says, "Could you… could you get s-something to eat, m-maybe?"

He looks at his knees. "M-mouses are yu-yummy, but I…"

You pat his knee with another soft smile. It's no problem for you to find something for him; maybe it'll take you a bit longer to return, but you find no issue with that.

Better, too, that he does not have a diet of dubious meat, or, once his prey has fallen, to try mushroom for his palette. Such things will only worsen his already poor condition.

He seems to cheer immensely, enough that he calls out a quiet 'goodbye' as you leave, shutting the door behind you.

* * *

The depths of this place are, indeed, as dangerous as you feared. Only for a short time did you linger here, and you don't regret that at all, but somehow you think that the Forest has grown bitter and petty at your return. It still welcomes you, hides you in its sweet, dense mushroom choked innards from too-quick too-strong hostiles; people overgrown with disease and rot and lost in whatever delusion the sweet musk of the trees envelopes them in. The flooded waters seem new, but you know you were not very sensible, in those first moments. You don't care to recall them, but you know all too well just how incomprehensive those memories are to you now.

You are glad, at least, that out of everything you could forget, you didn't forget them. Mushrooms may crowd out your lungs, the suit you wear part of your very body and unable to be removed, but you are not as others who have eaten the blood and flesh of the woods are. You are  _ of _ it, but you are not  _ it _ . Not yet. Not for a long time, you hope.

( _ rather, you are one part of two pieces; the sooner they understand that, the better. _ )

These murky, filthy waters seek to pull you under, but you are not alone, and you are not dead yet.

It has been both a very long time and a very short time since you've reunited. The Forest does not care for useless things like time, so it can be difficult to tell. 

The child - the  _ boy _ \- has been more than happy to receive your company; in this dangerous place, you've been cautious to venture far or for too long, but you never return without something to please him. You are stalwart in getting him things that can make him happy, and food is not just that - it's a necessity, for beings like him.

There isn't much left, the soil swallowing what little is there and famine taking the rest. You search thoroughly, despite the danger, despite the time it takes you; several times you end up spending a long, anxious night among the trees, unwilling to travel in the darkness. You must do this; the boy needs food. And even as you find mushroom aplenty, you know all too well that the boy's condition will only worsen if he is given more of the Forest's lifeblood. You are unwilling to risk it.

Several times, as you return - avoiding little feet, little bells - they catch you, just before they themself depart for regions unknown to you. You can see the confusion in their eyes; you've tried to explain, but still they seem to not understand why you've taken the boy into your care. You don't understand why you've done it yourself, but you find yourself trying to help  _ them _ understand.

So in the early mornings, and in the late evenings, you end up in long, winding discussions, spoken through hands and eyes and words on wrists. It is a very pleasant way to spend the time, even if it then eats into both of your plans for the day.

_ …this place is safe… i hope to help ease his pains… _

_...why? you can't stop it, better to leave him alone… _

_...do you recall what the trees took from you, yesterday? _

They are contemplative. You speak in spits and bursts, both of you disinclined - both of you still seeking, curiosity filling you in equal measure.

They make the boy uncomfortable, at first. You wonder if the two spoke before; you cannot tell, and neither are willing to discuss it if that is the case. The boy becomes quiet, quieter even than he already naturally is, clutching to his broken violin. But it isn't fear; if he were afraid, you would've asked them to stay away from the room. As much as you yourself enjoy their company, as much you wish they'd stay for just a little longer in the grey dawn - a frightened child is not a price you are willing to pay for their company.

Thankfully, however, it is not fear; no, amusingly enough… it is confusion. A lack of understanding, just like what they have for you and him. Confusion at another's actions. Maybe that interaction before led to this; perhaps not. Either way, as time passes, they seem more willing to linger beside you; to spend time, whether they know it or not, getting the boy used to both of your presences. Getting comfortable with their own strangeness, and yours as well.

It is with great pleasure that you begin to hear tales of what occurs when you are gone from the boy. He doesn't speak much; partly due to an aversion to speech, born of self conscious anxiety - but you also suspect that being around two silent individuals does not make for a loud third. All the same, when he is excited it is like he does not notice the stutter, and his happiness, momentary as it is, is infectious.

"T-today mister-sir let me play with those s-s-shiny rocks he likes!"

"I caught a y-yummy mouse for mister-sir! I, I think they l-liked it! D-do you like mouses, s-sir?"

"T-thank you, sir! N-n-no, sir, don't worry, I w-was ok! Mister-sir talked to m-me, they l-let me play! Th-they… they s-said I'm g-good! Sir, sir, th-th-they s-said I play g-good!"

You are happy that, with time, they've accepted the boy's presence. Never before did you dare to stay in their space, not overnight; never overnight. You feared what they might do.

( _ you were afraid you might not leave. _ )

But you are rarely late to return home, because although you've grown to love to hear the excitement and joy in the boy's voice when you return, you are also aware that they do not have as much patience as the boy now believes. You do not want that to change; you do not want the boy to be afraid. They won't ever hurt him, they are not so callous as to harm a child--

But… you are still nervous, leaving the boy alone for too long. They have other business to attend to, and the boy is safe behind the metal door, but you are never gone for longer than overnight. 

So at night, your time is usually spent speaking quietly to the boy, keeping watch as he falls into slumber, and, if you hear trouble close to the door - you take your only gun and carefully open it, killing what monsters you can whom wander too close.

Thankfully, that is rare; after so long, they have become almost as practiced at this as the locals are. Their safehouse has become quite literally that -  _ safe _ . What walls that were once damaged have been repaired, traps and barriers put up to deter slobbering jaws, and they are, all by themself, a living weapon. You are no freeloader, but funny enough it is like they take an overenthusiastic amount of pride in taking care of the nightly threats on their lonesome.

One late hour, close to morning, the boy startles you from your night-mood with a shout. You blink blearily, mind still frozen, counting the seconds-hours til dawn, before darting to your feet, heart athunder in your chest.

The child was asleep, curled into a comfortable ball atop the pillows you'd found by happenstance. He had whispered  _ goodnight  _ to you with a smile when you draped him in thick blankets, to fend off the cold.

Now, he seizes - his small arm flings out, his larger hand squeezing tight to his chest. His mouth trembles, and you hasten to his side as tears dribble from the cracks of his mask, mixing with the drool he struggles to contain when awake. You have no voice to wake him - he's dreaming, and it is no sweet dream that graces his mind.

You grasp his shoulder, fall onto your knees when he jerks beneath your touch, pushing you off balance. He shakes violently, thankfully no longer throwing his limbs out - but there is white hot terror bleeding off of him in waves, every muscle clenched tight. He flinches as you wrap your arm around him.

There is little you can do except hold him. Another memory whispers, soft and wispy, through your mind: waking from a night terror, your face tacky with sweat and tears. A presence, warm and gentle, draping a hand over your back, murmuring soft nothings that slowed your racing heart.

You try to emulate that, as best you can. You half-hug him, rocking you and him just enough to ease his shivers. Eventually, even, a crackling half-hum starts in your disused throat, and you close your eyes, praying fervently to no one that this helps him.

A shuffling sound breaks you from your focus. You keep half-humming, keep rocking him, belatedly realizing that you're definitely holding him, now, as he presses himself into as small a ball as he can against your side. You have to crane your neck to see behind you - a death sentence anywhere else, but you are happy to see it is only them.

They seem apprehensive, fingers lingering on the door. Light filters in behind them. Not daylight, unfortunately, but the quality of it suggests it will be morn soon.

You gesture with your head.  _ Come here. _

Their eyes flicker. Unusual; they are not one for hesitance.  _ Are you sure? _

_ Yes. _

They hesitate for just a little longer. But just as you begin to doubt them, they step into the room, closing the door safely behind them. Their footsteps are silent, their movement cautious, as if approaching a spooked animal.

The boy moves in your arms, just as they join you on the floor. As you watch together, an immense sigh wrestles from the boy's lungs, and his head shifts.

He's not quite awake, but he sees you, and his hand reaches up and grasps yours. Then, as drowsiness drags him back to his dreams, he reaches -

And they hold his hand in theirs, holding it as if it is something precious.

* * *

Weak sounds reach your ears; small, pitiful. They are sounds you've heard before, sounds you've heard many times over. The sounds of suffering and death.

Your eyes refuse to blink open for long, intangible moments; your lungs hiccough, reluctant and slow. When you finally wrest apart your gluey eyelids, you aren't sure where you are. A foreign calmness blankets thick o'er your shoulders, and you begin to walk.

The sky is black and grey, leeching soft as fuzzing cloth into the barren, lifeless ground. But not lifeless - no, not quite. Bodies writhe beneath your heels, croaking cries springing free from arching throats as their bodies contort into strange and unnatural shapes. Their eyes are closed; they are dreaming a dream far away from here. Distance felt only within the mind.

Stretching far overhead is an immense tower, a mountain of rock and corpses. Roots, gigantic and swollen with lifefluid unknown to you, trail through the rock. As you begin to climb, you see people in various stages of decomposition - melding into the roots, their bodies losing comprehension. Breathes struggle through their bodies, twitching their forms in heaving, helpless, stuttering gasps.

You only have eyes for what shines overhead. A light, a sun, a star; utterly colourless, it pulsates and throbs in time with your false heart. The scent of fetid rot, disease and old blood, mingles with that delicate taste on the tongue; fungal softness, spores that catch inside you.

You are too immolated inside your core to comprehend what is happening to you as you climb. Your mind is there, it is, but it is not. Your eyes shutter, a breath easing out of you; is this a dream? You don't dream. You can't sleep; you can't dream. Unreality presses upon you, shivering in static melody, pressing your skull sideways. And still you don't stop your climb. And still, you do not mind--

\--the spores erupting inside you. Your belly jostles, stretched until it bursts apart, spilling foul liquid down your legs, mushrooms spurting in endless rivulets, spreading up your torso and down your legs, overtaking your groin. Your lungs are filled, then overflow, and they begin to crowd inside your helmet; each blink hastens them back, but as seconds tick by, they grow immense and tumorous, swarming. As you struggle forward, fungal sprouts attempt to ground you, to still your movement. They spit out from your soles, attaching into the ruined soil - but cannot take deeper root before you are taking another step forward, straining the strands until they break. Leaving white stains behind you, in a weeping trail.

You do not mind any of it. Dislocated, numb, you climb - and you reach the top, your boots beginning to bleed red behind you as the mushrooms of your body absorb the diseased blood of the bodies you crush beneath your heel.

There, surrounded by weakly shivering forms, is… _something._ _Something_ stares at you, vast, colossal, incomprehendible. _It_ stares at you, _its_ many hands extended in false supplication - lifebloods funneled into _its_ devouring maw.

You're dreaming. You're dreaming.

You shouldn't be able to dream.

_ Something  _ begins to quake, an unmoving tremour that pours up through your fungi-riddled flesh, and  _ something _ rasps and wheezes in your ears. White inkblots on black sandpaper - your eyes burn, burn burn  _ burn, _ and you cannot gasp for what breath you had is swallowed by the toadstool and chanterelle that have eaten through your insides. White, long, spiraling shapes fill your eyes - and still, that soft, sweet scent thrums delicately in your remaining senses.

_ It _ has a cold, inhuman appendage, pressing against your closed eyelid, pressing through your gelatinous eyeball and spiking through into your soft brain meat.  _ It _ curls, hungry and still.  _ It _ waits.

Waits. Waits.

An eon passes. A millennium. A light second; the passing of a flinch, as a needle pricks the fingerpad.

_ It _ withdraws, and you are deep asleep in a dream about contentment, warm things you can never have once more. Dreaming, when you should never have begun.

When you wake, you remember none of this.

* * *

A split second of calm, and then -

"Mister-s, sir, can I p-play today?" His stutter fluctuates; sometimes better, sometimes worse. But that's ok; as long as he is ok, you don't mind however he speaks.

When they shake their head tiredly  _ no, _ the boy accepts with a wilted sigh. It is then that you turn to him, dig through your ever present sack, and present to him a small thing.

He gasps, delighted: it's nothing much, but you are glad you were able to find it. It's a small toy truck, worn to bits but still useable. He hesitates to grab it from you, but at your encouraging nod, he smiles widely - all his teeth showing, a truly awe inspiring amount - and takes it carefully off of your mittened palm. He seems awed, amazed; when he looks up, meeting your gaze, he whispers  _ thank you _ so softly that your heart squeezes in your chest.

You wave your hand, and turn to your brother. They don't lift their own head; the night before took a lot out of them. Why, you're not sure; the longer you've stayed here, the quieter it has become.

You do not know why. The Forest still whispers in hateful, desiring longing all around you, but you've encountered less and less hostilities in your own daily travels, and you've had better and better luck finding what the boy needs. You worry, of course you do, but some part of you hopes…

( _ hope that it will leave you be, as you try to help the boy take care of himself. _ )

Hope that… but you can't bring yourself to think that, even quietly.

It's then, to your surprise, that they pick their head up, calling the boy's attention to them. At their beckoning, the boy hesitates - but only for a moment.

Moving is still difficult for him, but it's become slightly easier at your nightly encouragement. So he shuffles, crouched carefully so as to not hit his head against the ceiling, and halts before them. He turns his toy in his clumsy palms; he doesn't speak.

Finally, they jerk their head - to the door. They grasp his fumbling hands in theirs, and for a long moment they bend their head, their forehead meeting his. The boy lets out a shaky exhale, a hiccup, and quakes - just for a split second. When they sit up once more, departing, they leave behind a candy they must've saved from somewhere. The boy stutters, unable to form a  _ thank you _ as he did for you - before doing as they had silently requested.

Both of you feel safe enough, letting him play just outside the metal door. You don't know why they desire privacy so suddenly, but attacks have both lessened in frequency and grown in sound. You'll both be alerted quickly enough if need be.

They turn to you, warped features hidden beneath the brim of their hat and scarf. They reach their hands out, palms up; they've wrapped old injuries in cloth, blotted with dried blood and the markings of infection. They wait.

You grasp their hands, laying your palms atop theirs. A peace comes over you; your eyes flicker, then slide shut. A breath whistles out of you, all gentle and warm sound; you can hear their own breathing, calm, just a bit faster than your own slow, deep inhales. Together, you breath in silence. Your air intermingles; you imagine your breath exchanged, their exhalations pulled into your lungs, and yours pulled into theirs. Shared; cycled between your two parts. You feel whole, and you feel that you ought to feel water pearl in your eyes, but your eyeballs are flat, deflated things, and your tearducts shriveled to nothing.

Outside, dimly, you can gear the happy murmurs the boy makes as he sucks on his sweet candy and plays with his old toy truck. He's at ease, and becoming more so as time yawns on.

A tap on your left palm, and you open your eyes. Their iris glow in dim light; their pupils are swollen, glutted in the dark. They meet your gaze, and a rasping, rustling sound creaks from the narrow space between you. Lips, moving beneath layers of crackling, stiff cloth.

You almost begin to shake your head, not understanding - but then they close their eyes, their body heaving up and down in a sigh. When they open their eyes again, they are filled with the first emotion beyond mindless determination, ruthless drive.

They look so sad. Your hands clench reflexively around theirs.

They shake their head again, throwing a glance to the ajar metal door, to the boy beyond. Taking their hand from yours, they dig within their deep pockets - coming up with something sickly familiar to you. It's becoming  _ hatefully _ familiar to you.

_ The road home. _

_ That is  _ no _ road home, _ you want to say, to scream, to shout. Instead, a thin wheeze echoes out from your dilapidated lungs.  _ That is no road home. _

They hold it carefully, at once fearful and possessive, like a gentle, fragile thing in their palm. They take it back from your vision, looking down at it, before holding it close to their chest; they look back towards the boy, down again, and then so quietly, emptily, back to you.

They had held the boy's hand, through numerous nightmares. Had accompanied you, several times over, to find proper food, clothes, blankets, sweet things for him.

But nothing is more important to them than to go home. You know they've found their lust for vengeance sated already, the doctor you took them away from in the midst of diseased night and feverish terrors fallen to the hush and whim of the Forest. They have not spoken to you of what, exactly, they seek, but you realize now - putting together their behavior over the past few weeks - that they have been putting off what they need to do. Shirking their determination, their overpowering homesickness.

Why? For what? It seems no longer to matter. They have decided, now. They won't be distracted any longer.

Your hand shakes as you scrawl across your wrist.  _ So, will you turn us out, brother? _

They take one glance, eyes gone black in the gloom, and shake their head. Slowly, at first, before picking up speed. They seem distressed, for a split moment, their body rocking, their fingers scrambling harshly at their wrists--

Then, they grasp your hands again, afevered, eyes aflame. They fairly crush your stick of charcoal as they force your palms closed, their eyes bulging.

Then, they fall flat again. They hold your hands loosely. Your knees touch theirs, but you are a million miles away. They are once more the familiar-unfamiliar stranger you had met all that time ago. They are once more the warped reflection, once more bleeding and faceless.

You shake your head, and lean forward.

You would follow them. You  _ will _ follow them because they are going to leave, on that insidious road, down into the depths of this Forest that drools and throbs around you, at once a throat struggling to swallow and a mouth, salivating at your body only inches away.

But you can't leave now. You  _ can't _ . The boy is naught but a child, and won't survive for long on his own. Starvation, further sickness, animals, monsters, the villagers, the trees themselves - so much and more flashes through your mind, and your heart clenches in fear. He has no one. You've good as promised him you'd take care of him.

You can't leave him. You must follow them. If they depart on this journey into the black nothingness of obscene undeath, you will follow, you will leave. It hurts your head; it hurts your damned false paper heart.

You shake your head again. You're close enough together that their hat bumps against your helmet; you can see the twisted flesh of their face, lines drawing their lower face into a snarl and their eyelids stretched wide, so that the full orb of their eye lies exposed to the air. Their lower eyelashes are tacked together, standing black like spider legs under the jelly of their sclera. Burst blood vessels stain the whites red and purple, black as it festers into infection. Their iris flickers, meeting your gaze; you wonder what they think, what they see.

Little strands of dulled red hair, pasted to their forehead from sweat, are visible just beneath the fold of their hat.

You shake your head again, mussing their hair via the movement of their hat. Their face does not twitch.

You glance out toward the boy, and your heart begins to pound in your chest. You hope, hope beyond hope. Hope senselessly, hopelessly, wordlessly.

That they'll understand. That they'll accept.

You don't write. You grasp their hands, between your two chests, hold them still against the wall for too long of a time, an impossible stretch. Their pulse beats a beautiful staccato against your clothed hands. You can feel the very faintest shiver, before they seize themself and force themself to stop.

You draw patterns into their palms, then against their rising-and-falling chest. You try. You try.

When they nod, all you can do is shakily nod back, drawing out of their space as carefully and quickly as you can. You can see the reluctance to acquiesce, that always strong drive - but then they look out to where the boy cheerfully plays, and they look down at their hands, those hands that so gently hold his when he seeks their company, and they look up with glowing white animal eyes, look to you.

They look bereft.

You draw that up to your imagination, and you go to retrieve the boy, ready to listen to his daily music.

* * *

You trudge through an outcrop of trees, monoliths that whisper amongst themselves, hidden thoughts that you can feel breathe out from the dense undergrowth. The mushroom patches follow you as you hasten your pace, fattened caps turning like faces, stems lengthening and twisting in turn.

But there is a safety in your journey, a safety that you cannot help but trust. It is in the way growling mutterings skitter away from you, pressing themselves deeper into the dark depths of the Forest that no one must venture to. It is the way the sun rises high overhead, piercing through the dense, intertwined branches above. You have yet to understand it - just as you have yet to understand how it is that you've become susceptible to slumber, and to dream.

You breathe a sigh, air folding in and out of you, tasting sweet.

Upon your back is your precious cargo - new clothes for the boy, better fitting, various foodstuffs that he might enjoy. An old book - an encyclopedia, you think, but you're not sure. He'd mentioned he misses his old picture books, and then had gone quiet. This isn't quite what he might be missing, but you hope it will cheer his spirits nonetheless.

And, perhaps most precious of all - an incredibly well preserved flute. The boy is, after all, the little musician; he's chattered, happily remembering for once and not in dismay, about the old upright piano his grandmother had kept in her basement. He hadn't said it, but you can tell he wished he'd been allowed to play it, that long time ago.

They had simply patted his back, and when he looked confused, they had motioned as if - playing a flute.

The boy couldn't help himself; you smile your lopsided maybe-smile, thinking of how his entire being lit up in excitement. You hadn't known that they'd been of any musical talent.

They'd seemed embarrassed. But all the same, talk of music was something the boy had a hidden passion for. He talked of the old music player he'd used to teach himself, learning by mimicry, with little knowledge of the keys and strings he played. But despite his fumbling, you both always applauded at the end of his daily playing. He always bowed, so awkward with his proportions, holding his violin ever so carefully in hands.

The flute will make him happy. They might not be able to play it, but that is not necessary for teaching. You hope that they do not mind.

These various things are the product of trade. Something you had thought impossible - but the Elephants are an isolated group, keeping tightly to themselves. You hadn't known what to make of the frankly overwhelming amount of beartraps surrounding their shelter, but you'd known that there must be something of value hidden there.

You're glad you persevered. Not only because they wouldn't have faired well continuing on without their generator functioning, but also for the ties you've built with them.

They had been recalcitrant at first, no doubt offput by your clear sickness. But just as others had before, your silent and calm composure relaxed them, and your helmet gave the impression of containment. The Elephants, in fact, acclimated to you faster than expected, due to that. They praised the airtight appearance of your body, and were pleased at your mechanical aptitude.

Of course, they did not let you in. As far as you can tell, they must be a family. Blood related, perhaps, but it is difficult to tell with their own gasmasks obscuring their features. A mother, you believe, and her children.

That also served you - for as soon as you wrote upon the paper they pushed beneath their door, and passed it back to them, the mother seemed to relax. You'd asked, and explained, that you needed supplies for a child you'd begun taking care of. She'd drilled you for information: where did the child come from? is there anyone else assisting in his care? are you related? is he ill?

The last question you carefully evade, but you are as upfront with her as possible. There are many vile things in these woods, after all, and not all of them sprung free from the Forest.

After awhile, she accepted the truth. Whether she had tired from asking you question after question in concern for an unknown child not of her own blood or not, or if she truly did believe you - you don't mind either way. Living in the Forest, struggling to survive and care for lives much weaker than herself - you can't blame her for letting the matter go, despite how untrustworthy you know you must surely appear to be.

She proves to be a very useful trading partner. Where she finds these things, you do not know. You know some of it must come from her own storage, cast offs from her children and things no longer of use to any of them. Clothes, which you thankfully are capable enough of altering the fit of for the boy, and food, which is always free of the Forest's touch. You supply her with materials for craftwork, and whatever you can find that might serve her better than you and your companion. They always have a reliable stockpile of their own; they are well enough that you can trade away what you find peaceably enough.

Your trade lines have become more fruitful, in all directions, really. You studiously avoid the little feet with their bells, and keep away from their own trade partners. You do not need for much. You only trade to attain things for the boy, some things not easily found on your lonesome.

It is amusing, later on, to hear from the Elephant mother that they have visited her. She tells you, in an upfront manner, that she should've expected "your partner" to drop in at some point.

She also sternly tells you that they are a disgusting, diseased leper, and that she is glad that you at least have the sense to keep your mouth shut. She grows quiet when you do not answer. Then, with a clearness you've begun to realize she rarely has, she says, "I suppose you are as mute as they are, aren't you?"

You do not know whether that has altered her trust towards you, but she does not stop her trade with you. You decide to take it in stride.

What they were looking for, you do not know. You know that, despite your agreement, they continue their preparations.

You are strangely calm, thinking of it. As you reach the final stretch to home -  _ to the safehouse _ \- you try to discern yourself as you once were so able to do. Were you able to, though, or was that a misspoken memory from a time you never experienced?

( _ blessed calm. it is blessedly calm, and it touches you every night. _ )

The boy shouts from where he plays out in the yard. His hunched back has shrunk down, just a little; he doesn't flinch as he cranes his permanently angled head up, free of pain.

You dismiss your musings, and hurry to greet him.

( _ away, away… _ )

* * *

The Forest is changing, and you are at once ignorant to it and all too aware, overwhelmingly, intensely aware.

You've known it to be happening for some time. When you followed them here, to this last outcrop before plunging deep into the abyssal darkness, you remember the anger, the venomous, seething anger in every twitch of the roots and foliage around you. The reluctance, and then greed when you nestled yourself tight within the furrows of its skin. Mushrooms seeding into your clothed skin, spikes of white-hot pain cutting deep into you when you struggled free. The way it coaxed that awful white fluid from the edges of your mouth when it burned across the soft sweetness, bursting into wet rot.

You don't know where that magnanimity went. Perhaps it is asleep.

You breathe easier. They don't stare at you with moon filled eyes; they stop twitching their fingers so much, face contorting into dark shapes. The wooded areas are quiet, the waters still except for the infrequent hum and ripple of insects. Absent of bloated corpses. Absent of dripping, cherry red mouths, suckling at your ankles hungrily.

Most of all - the boy.

He's grown just slightly smaller, his movements finally fitting. He's still clumsy. He doesn't spend hours, hours you spend alongside him, whining helpless in body aches and unnatural pains that won't leave him be. But they have left him be. He has not woken, crying, in some new fierce agony. Not for some time.

You try not to fear it. Try to fear the way you can see, visibly, the shrinking of his stretched ligaments, the relaxing of the tree roots that thread through his skin. His mask is rooted,  _ fixed _ , to him, but it no longer creaks, cracking apart into oozing wounds at the edges of his face. You did what you could for his illness before, but it was too far along - even they knew that it was a waiting game, waiting until the sickening end the boy is oblivious to. 

_ Was. _ Was oblivious to.

Because now, before your very eyes - it recedes. It does not vanish; he is still deeply, irreversibly held within the Forest's grip. But it recedes, and he smiles more, and he reads the books you find with a child's curiosity. He asks questions, and makes games for the three of you to play together. He'll never, admittedly, be very good at music - but his enthusiasm is ignited by his sudden ability to move his fingers as he truly wishes to do, and he tries to play the old flute and his violin at the same time.

You clap, and try not to worry over how his violin is no longer so small in his arms, or how his mouth can now hold the flute properly. He'd struggled with that; he had many more teeth than he used to, and a long, uncomfortable tongue he'd spent some time insulting as he struggled to do as they instructed.

They remain silent in all of this. At most - they change their schedule, slowly, their daily routine. They spend breakfast with you and the boy. You cannot eat, even if you had to, and you thought them the same; it is with surprise that you watch as they pull their headscarf down, nabbing a chunk of bread that the boy had intended to grab. He laughs, and they smile, crumbs on their face, when they give him a chocolate coin they'd found or traded for.

Your neighbors seem blind to all of it, but you know they are not. After so long spent in miserable struggle, all knowing it to simply be the endless death throes of a long deceased corpse, there are skittering, flashing eyes, eyewhites pulsing oddly in the lowlight.

There is a lighter scent to the air. The sun touches the flooded waters, and flowers blossom full and heavy. There is something happening.

You prefer to pretend at sightlessness. You bury yourself in blindness. Whatever the Forest is slobbering for, it will capture it with its poisoned honey very soon. The rest of you have no choice but to stutter, failing at holding your breath, before losing what tension you had in this seemingly unending sunlit meadow of time.

And time, indeed, passes onward. The boy gets taller, properly; he shrinks down, then springs back up, back straighter.

* * *

You stare, struck silent, into the hollow emptiness of the room. The thing that is your heart stills. Then, it squeezes into a dense marble, surging up your chest. Your lungs shrivel. 

You cannot breath.

You blink. As if that will change the burning empty corners of the room, unoccupied and deathly still. You blink again.

After a forever time, in which you stand there, mittened palm still resting on the doorknob, a hand - as familiar-unfamiliar as your own fused together fingers - rests itself on your shoulders.

You turn to them, mind gone to static and nothing else.

The boy isn't there.

_ The boy isn't here. _

All at once, a puff of air seizes in your throat - you jerk, a spasm of movement, and your boots are so very loud as you bolt out of the building.

Fear, bitter as burdock, as the turnip the Elephant mother had somehow begun to grow in the quiet recesses of her house, roots that you carefully cleaned the soil off of and boiled for the boy. He would watch you, too, and you'd point to the purple eyes that sprouted unnaturally from some of them, watch as you picked them free, sliced them open, examined the insides. Trying to learn as you try to teach him what to save and eat, and what to bury among the trees.

Fear, fear, fear such as you've only felt once before hammer through your useless, fungi-riddled guts, shake free bits of the lichen that has begun to cling to your temples. Fear, fear,  _ fear _ .

Behind you, you can dimly hear their padded footsteps. Your own scream out into the vastness surrounding you, stamping blooms beneath your soles, pollen and spores bursting into the daylight.

You know, you know you should calm down. Be quiet. Be silent.

You can't. You can't. The Forest is immense and it is always, forever and always, hungry and lusting.

Images flare in your head, and you try to squeeze your dry eyes shut to them but they fill your mouth and you begin to choke under them. You crash through the trees blindly, overcome.

_ His body, drained dry or tumefied, as if long submerged since drowning. The tree he rests against oh so delicately holds his head in a cradle, tree roots sinking under his skin, twining through his flesh. His eyelids flicker. His chest rises, shivers, quaking, pausing; jumps up, then deflates, and all over again. _

A hand comes out from the dark, and you spin around, fear-fear- _ fear _ stamping a hideous tempo in your thoughts, but then they pull you near and--

You shiver, shaking. They are as averse to touch as you - but you've always swallowed down your knee-jerk reaction in favour of giving the boy the gentle comfort he needs. Now, they swallow theirs down to give you what they think you need.

Quietly, slowly, you come back to your senses.

When they pull back, meeting your gaze, you see your reflection, warped as it is, in the rounded swell of their eyes. Your eyes are swollen wide in your skull, fog riddling the filthy glass of your helmet, leaving only those blank, flat organs visible. They appear, almost, to pulsate hideously in the gloom.

You tear yourself away, unable to take that image of yourself any longer.

You try to think clearly. The boy, the boy - he must have left of his own free will. There was no sign of a fight - no blood, no broken furniture. They had given him a knife and a small gun for him, and you had taught him what you could of how to use such things safely. You tried to instill an instinct to hide, and hide well, first and foremost. They may be able to wake upon the dawn after the severing of their head from their neck, but you and the boy have no such luxuries.

The boy knows how to defend himself, at least a little. He is still so very, very vulnerable. Anxiety crawls into your chest, birthing a hundred thoughts into your veins that freeze you still, that ache like frostbite.

But there's something you realize, now, as they tap your elbow, reach their hand out to you. You take it, and realize that it was the first thing they had thought, and that you, you who has devoted now several years to the care of this child, had not and could not consider. Not at first, but you catch up to them as they lead you through the trees.

Your heart shivers, but its beating begins to calm.

Time is difficult to track, but the boy must have been… nine or so, when he was alone in the safehouse. Now… he must be older. You can't tell with any measure of surety, but you feel it must be close to four years now, mustn't it?

He doesn't stutter as badly anymore. His jaw changed into a shape more suitable for him, and alongside his growing confidence, his strange constant cheer, despite his nightmares and the spots of time where you and he must lock yourselves behind the metal door and let them take care of hostile shades - he's grown more comfortable with his alien body. He sometimes pats your hand with little whispers of  _ sir, y-you'll feel ok soon, won't y-you, sir-r? _ You never have the heart to tell him that this has always been your body. That you are always accepting of its constant decay.

_ He's just a kid, _ you think furiously, following as they lead you along the perimeter of your home, your safehouse.  _ He's just a kid. _

But kids grow up, and you know the boy has a streak of determination, cultivated by your brother, your companion. Your companion, who watches you with bizarre moon filled eyes, droplets of the sky caught within their round, exposed surfaces.

They must know where he's gone. But as you meet their gaze, struggling to swallow, you know that they trust he will be ok. You know that edge to their gaze - they are just as afraid as you.

The day is long. The eve is long. The night is long.

They take a torch and plunge it into the earth, leaving it upright. Beyond the call of birds that cause crawling sensations up and down your arms,  _ not supposed to be there, _ beyond your fear - you watch them.

They still collect what they need for their final journey, you know that. But they also approach you, when you leave the boy's presence for some calm to yourself, and they sit silently beside you. As they do now.

Each time, every time. You think it, hold it tight to your chest.

_ I'll follow you, brother, you can't leave without me. _

And, quieter.

_ Please don't go. Please stay. _

You can't read them. Or, maybe you can - but along with the loss of your own discernment, of your solitude and your wanderings you once had buried yourself within in the absence of their willing company, you can but you won't. As they sit beside you, the same as all the times before, you feel that same sense. Loss, longing, frustration, sadness. Melancholia, a heady ambrosia, and you wish forever and always that you and they could remain here, in this moment, forever lonely.

They turn to you, expression spilled black by night-darkness and starkly cut apart by the torchlight, and you stare back.

As a point of comfort, perhaps, or something selfish - they grasp your hand, and you reach up, and you cup their face awkwardly with your free palm.

You swear that--

A shout - you both jump, and break apart, two clouds that converged and then fell into pieces, the wind an uncaring, gentle force.

You climb to your feet, knees aching, and cannot help the wheeze that bursts from your weak lungs at the sight.

_ He's ok. _

The boy runs to you, and before you can react, wraps his arms around you. He squeezes you, only just shorter than you - and he used to be taller than you by a good measure - and lifts you off your feet. Your throat makes a helplessly relieved sound, and then he drops you, smiling inhumanly wide, and you smile back, too relieved to be angry at what they were right to assume was a willful choice.

"I'm s-sorry," he says, but he's smiling too wide for it to be honest. "I-it wa-was, was just--"

Behind him, a small face peeks, bowed down to hide its expression with a curtain of dull, dusty brown hair.

You blink. The other child blinks blankly back at you.

The boy gulps, then nervously giggles. "I, it, it's ju-just, mister-sir, h-he mentioned…"

Oh.

_ Oh. _

You can't help yourself, again - you turn and  _ glare _ at them. They sheepishly shrug, rubbing the back of their head. An embarrassed blush pinks what little of their face you can see.

The boy just laughs, his new little friend smiling at nothing.

* * *

The Elephants are people you kept the boy from knowing, before. But your companion told stories, and the boy wasn't stupid - he asked you, again and again, when he could play with the children they told him about.

It seemed like something you were doomed to disappoint him with, his unfulfilled desire for friends, but with the return of the lost child, they were strangely accepting - despite the boy's illness.

It was the first time you had ever seen them. You had not known how many children she had - that was something they had known, apparently. She had had seven children, you came to learn - as well as a husband, a grandmother, a grandfather.

You were not one to care about  _ who's who to who. _ What did it matter? But it was a strange feeling, learning so much so belatedly about the woman who seems to trust you the most, with trust based on something entirely false.

It is stranger still - watching as they accept the boy into their fold. Of course, they asked that he cover his mouth with cloth, dress in many layers. Like a leper. Almost - almost like your companion. It made a shiver run down your dissolving spine, to see how similar they looked, dressed almost exactly the same. Especially when amongst a group of people who all wore exactly the same thing.

To see them, the three children, huddle down on the ground in a half circle around the boy. To watch as they teach him little rhyming games, little poems and songs. The boy loves their drawings, and he joyfully begins to experiment with crayons and doodling alongside them. They love his music - one, the child, Marcin, Marcinek, loves it especially, and soon picks up the boy's flute and finds a special talent for it.

The mother always hides in the other room, praying, she says - or perhaps unable to bear seeing her children playing so cheerfully with a sick creature like the boy. She comes out with tears in her eyes after an hour or so each time, and quietly asks you to leave.

It's alright. She lets you bring the boy to play frequently enough.

Each time you leave, though, you and your brother and the boy you try to teach - each time, you think of her blubbered words, the way she grabbed her child, snatched him up, and squeezed him to her chest. Her confused anger at his maskless face, her relief.

They tell you, later, that the boy had found the child in a hidden place, deep within the mushroom field. There was an old woman, with old, warm eyes. She was the mother's mother, and she asked that Marcin please come visit her again.

You know she won't see the child again.

* * *

And time passes. The flowers bob in the wind, and grow. The children play, and soon their sounds grow more frequent, and their laughter flows upon the wind. The dense mushroom patches grow thicker, more tempting to lay in, to rest in the warm afternoon sun - and the waters begin to run, artificial rivers and creeks that dance everywhere they please.

There is a wolfman, the wolfman. He never had the patience for you, in the Old Wood. He sneered, contemptuous of your easy bending to the villagers' demands, finding you as spineless as the fungi that so loves you.

He wanders, occasionally, somehow finding his way here from his own territory. He never bloodies his teeth. Just watches from a distance, confusion and something like the longing you feel when your hand brushes theirs haunting the yellow flatness of his eyes. Always, he departs without a word.

A man keeps you away from what remains of the old village. He throws erroding bricks at you, shouts uselessly, terrified and blind but you can feel his gaze upon you. Sometimes, you realize, his eyes dart and flash - and as you withdraw, willing to leave him be, you hear that ever ominous sound of small feet and bells, the click-clack of rusted scrap metal.

There are still many things within this distorted reflection of the Forest that have not lost their taste for blood. Keeping away is safer than sating your curiosity, no matter how it itches at you.

And your companion, your brother, they silently do as they are wont to do. There is a drive in them. There is blood on their hands. There is a hatchet, and a gun they do not put away. For all the softness that has become your life, for all that you calmly teach the boy what you can of survival and what you know of living, drawn from dusty memories that are not your own, you know that the Forest is only giving you this because… because…

Is the Forest capable of that?

You dismiss the thought. You want no longer to think of it.

_ Just don't leave yet, _ you don't ask them, late into the night, as they sit beside you as the boy dreams gentle dreams, nightmares and terrors grown infrequent.  _ Don't leave yet. _

Each time, they hesitate - and then they run their hand along the back of your helmet, down the incline of your back, and you know that they know you cannot feel any of it just as you can feel the full width of their palm, the press of the pads of their fingertips. The calluses from weapons and violence. The shaky way their breath blooms across the glass of your helmet.

It's just a kindness. It's just a small thing they give to you. You know. You know.

And still, each time, you make that sound the boy calls a song, and you lean forward and shut your eyes, as if someday you might bleed through your helmet and touch your forehead to their rising-falling chest.

The  _ longing _ creates a pit inside you, falling forever down. You don't feel like a coin, a half wishing endlessly for their eyes to open and see and  _ listen. _ You wish, instead, that they'd just stay.

Just stay. You won't want, won't ask.

They come back, one late hour. The boy has, as has become his routine, as he has become capable, left to go to the Elephants'. The mother quietly accepts him among her children, and does not protest. The boy always wears his coats, and his mouth covering, draped warmly over the curve of his skull. Time is passing. He smiles and says  _ tomorrow's my birth, birthday, w-when's your birthday, s-sir? _

You are becoming foreign and faraway to your own life, and you smile because you have always been that way, but as the boy drifts away - always just a boy, a kid, a child to you, quietly crying as he fearfully watches you and them put your heads together and fix his violin after his grip grew too tight and shattered the neck of it for the third time - and as they hover, the both of you remembering that silent agreement, that deal you made all those many nights ago, you begin to depart again.

They come back, after their busy daily searching, one late hour. The morn is soft, distant through the black trees. Their figure cuts a silhouette, unchanged as you wish you could be. You've grown slower, as the roots begin to suffocate themselves, no more space to grow.

You weren't made for much at all. No, not much at all.

There is a bed they made from scraps of wood, a mattress you threaded carefully together under dim electric lamplight. It was made for the boy. He lets you use it when he thinks you to be tired. You always fall asleep before you can scribble, lopsided and tired,  _ I have no ability to slumber. _

( _ It watches you, each time, in a dream of sunlight; you can't dream, you can't dream, and still you do. It doesn't care at all. It doesn't feel tired at all, watching you sleep so peacefully. _ )

They sleep, sometimes, although it is just as unnecessary. They never sleep well. They are a tired, ever moving machine; always going forward, toward a pitch black endless dream.

You are laying in the bed when they come home, that late hour, their silhouette cutting through the white light of the generator, the hum falling away as they move forward. The rustle of their clothes pushes you to sitting, and you cant your head, patting the space beside you.

They settle in. Their hands motion; holding tight, then releasing, held aimlessly apart. You dig in your pocket, and find your old bit of charcoal. Ever useful.

_ What is it? _

They shake their head.

_ Is there anything you need? _ You gesture with your head, to your bag that lies atop a dresser across the room.  _ I still have much I can give you. Everything that is mine, is yours. _

They shake their head again.

You hum thoughtfully, and take one of their aimless hands within yours. You know they understand;  _ we need to stick together. _

You can't bring yourself to even think the last part of that wordless question - but thankfully, they shake their head once more, and you feel your back untense in relief.

Not yet. Not yet.

( _ clinging. _ )

Then, their hand fully returns your grip. They squeeze, almost painful - you can see the milky give, the way your not-flesh acts under their force. You tell yourself they don't see - but, as your heart pounds, you look up to meet their gaze, and you see the reflection of your hand, giving under the pressure of their human grip. Their still human grip, despite the way their mouth waters when they think you don't see.

You never lied to them. Your hands shake.  _ There's no way out, I never lied to you, we must stick together, are you listening? _

All of it surges through your mind, heavy on your useless tongue. Soot tags and mycorrhizal networks, webs of sticky-sweet decay. Moldering, putrefying as you stare, wide eyed at them.

You weren't built to last, either, you know. You wonder if this is why.

They say nothing, do nothing. Their mouth opens, beneath the red rags they've tied in spirals about their head, and then it closes. Their eyes seem to glisten.

There are many things to be found in the depths, swallowed up and then regurgitated, unpalatable. They, you know, have traveled widely, for a long time now. Even before, before you opened your eyes, strings of white slush breaking in pops as you began to move. As you began to breath, weakly, cordyceps already blooming eagerly in the droplets of blood they had sprayed, coughing and choking, as their binds grew tighter and tighter.

You close your eyes. Shouts growing frenzied, louder and louder, delirious with fever. You remember, you remember…

With a breath sucked in through the teeth, they turn away. Then, fumbling into their own deep pockets, they find--

A bullet. Soft; off colour. They roll it between their fingers, then let it lie flat upon their bandaged palm. And they hold it out to you.

You're falling into a pit you didn't make. You take it from them, and their eyes close, expression strange.

And still, as the sun drifts in through the curtains, the boy to come back in a few hours time - and still, they curl up, and they press their face into your shoulder.

Their breaths condensate against your clothes, your skin.

* * *

The air is warm. The air is orange, stained white, filtered through yellow; the light of sunrise, sunset, of afternoon turned syrupy gold. Sunday, yes, and it has been long years and hours, but you still recall… still recall the aroma of flowers, gardenias and morning glories, and the perfume of your mother's baking.

The door opens; it was never closed. You close your eyes, and breath easily; your head lies unobstructed upon the pillow, the tickle of your hair spread out around your head.

This is that first safe place, where you took them when they struggled, weak and incoherent. This is that small place, that place they left as quickly as they could, as if staying would set fire to their eyes, would burn them away into nothing.

A hand, so delicate and cautious, brushes against your temple. You open your eyes, and meet their gaze.

Outside, the happy sounds of excitement; a celebration or a party. You know not which. The boy is taller than you now, and he treats his small hand and large hand exactly the same. He convinced the old man in the village to let him play for him, among those drowned ruins. He likes to go and visit the elderly woman in the mushroom meadow, taking with him drawings his friends secretly drew for her.

The little Musician is a kind boy. Soft, and polite, and eager. The Stranger still thinks him strange, still gets that confused glint in their eye when they think you are not watching.

You listen dimly to the sounds of his efforts; he almost did not manage, did he? So many were adverse to his desires. But he did what he could. His own illness is still there, in its strange half state, but he is a strong kid. He was always a strong kid.

_ I promised you. _

They still meet your gaze. Their hands skim over your face, and you cannot see them, and you know they cannot see you. This honey sweet place is just yours.

They look to the door, that open door.

_ He's ready. He's alright. _ If you leave. If you leave, he'll be alright. It's been a long time. He hasn't needed you to teach him anything for a long time.

Your heart hurts in your chest. You take a deep breath, and then another. Don't know how to say it; don't know what to say, even if you did.

It's alright, staying like this. Your own bubble of muffled sound, their leg pressed to yours, their hand so slowly running through your hair. You are silent, together in this moment.  _ Stay still, stay still, don't let this be over yet. _

But they must. They must. Home, such a concept; what does it mean to you? Through fogged senses, you remember a tall building. You remember climbing many stairs, because the elevator was always out of order. You remember smiling when you see your dog wait patiently for you to close the door behind you, and then he bounds to you and wags his short tail, licking your hands and wrists all over. Smiling his dog grin.

And you remember smelling something rich, tomato and meat. Soup; still warm on the stove. A note from - somebody, and then the rest of it blurs softly away.

They hum. They've rested their forehead against your cheek, and you shut your eyes again, your heart swelling to bursting. You wish they'd just curl up beside you, and you'd hold them. You'd hold them.

You still hope. You don't have anything else; don't they understand? You'll follow them; everywhere, anywhere, nowhere. You know they want to leave. To go home; to the road home.

The road home doesn't exist. There is no  _ home  _ anymore.

They do not listen. They are standing, away from you - you sit up, once more trapped in your increasingly suffocating suit, reach out your mittened hand helplessly.

_ Don't go. Please. Please, not yet, not yet. _

They'd fulfilled their promise, though. They can leave if they wish. As you stare into that blinding light beyond the door, the sounds of the boy and his joy growing ever fainter behind you, their shadow stretches impossibly long.

_ Close the door, come back, stay. Stay. _

The light does not fade. They stand, unmoving, and you can feel every part of them ache - they're so tired. Just let them go home. Please. Just let them go home.

You choke. You bring your fists to your eyes - no, they clack against the glass, and you can't breath. Everything is filled up, fungi infection devouring the space between your flat eyes and the pane of glass.

Just let them go home.

_ No, please, please. _

The road home. It extends, an arm disappearing into the horizon. Leaving this nightmare behind.

_ No. It will only lead you deeper; only, only-- _

_ Please, please, please don't go. _

* * *

And in the morning, they are gone away from you.

  
  
  



End file.
